Hendricks executes well in first matchup against Bryant
When Kris Bryant's San Francisco teammates asked him for inside info on Cubs starter Kyle Hendricks, Bryant realized he didn't have any.
"I've only faced him like one time in summer camp last year," Bryant said before Friday's matchup at Wrigley Field. "Obviously, I played my whole career with him here. Just a guy that is the same every single day. I think that's his advantage over everybody is that you have no clue what's going through his mind on the mound, good or bad, and that's what makes him so great.
"Happy he's still here because he's a big part of the success and the team we had and he doesn't get talked about enough."
Hendricks won the battles. He got swinging strikeouts on Bryant's first 2 at-bats, then coaxed a broken-bat grounder to short. The Giants scored 5 runs off Cubs relievers, however, and won the game 6-1.
"We had a good game plan going in," Hendricks said. "Luckily, I just executed against him. Specifically, I executed pretty much every pitch. If you make mistakes on him, that's where he's going to hurt you.
"Luckily I was just able to execute and kept it moving. He really crushes mistakes and I think he's probably looking to do something pretty special while he's here, so we were trying to keep him from doing that."
Hendricks and the rest of the Cubs appeared to enjoy the Bryant tribute video as much as their former teammate. There was plenty of applause in the Cubs dugout. Bryant was wearing sunglasses during the pregame video, but appeared to wipe away tears a couple of times.
"Just a really cool moment," Hendricks said. "He deserved all that, so I know he was probably going through a lot today, a lot of different emotions. It's good to see just how he was received."
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